Ahmadreza Djalali

Facts of the case

Ahmadreza Djalali is a Swedish resident, father of two children and Professor in disaster medicine at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel and the Universita Degli Studi Del Piemonte Orientale. He was arrested on the 25th of April 2016 while he was travelling in Iran after having been invited by the University of Tehran and Shiraz to attend workshops on disaster medicine. Since then, he has been detained in inhumane conditions in Tehran’s Evin Prison. His arrest and detention are based on false suspicions of collaboration with “enemy States”.

Pr. Djalali has spent months in solitary confinement while being subjected to intense interrogations aimed at forcing him to sign confessions. He has been denied access to a lawyer for over seven months and has then systematically been denied his right to communicate with a counsel of his own choosing. To protest against his arbitrary detention, he has conducted several hunger strikes that have severely affected his health.

Action taken by the Foundation

In February 2017, the HRL Foundation submitted a communication to the United Nations requesting 1) that a joint urgent appeal be sent to the Iranian authorities by the relevant Special Procedures (the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention; the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment) and 2) that an opinion be adopted by the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention about the arbitrary character of Pr. Djalali’s deprivation of liberty.

The Foundation still follows the case very closely and keeps the United Nations informed with up-to-date information.

The communication sent by the HRL Foundation to the United Nations requesting a joint urgent appeal

The joint urgent appeal sent by the United Nations to the Iranian authorities